


safe and sound

by Werepirechick



Category: Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (Cartoon 2018), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - All Media Types
Genre: Adopted Sibling Relationship, Canon Compliant, Domestic Fluff, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Family Fluff, Fluff and Humor, Gen, Implied/Referenced Past Relationships, Injury Recovery, Missing Scene, One Shot, Post-Finale, Post-S2 Premiere, Team as Family, bc everyone here deserves some downtime after those episodes, honestly just a lot of really happy-fuzzies inducing content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-26
Updated: 2019-11-26
Packaged: 2021-02-26 07:42:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,369
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21570091
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Werepirechick/pseuds/Werepirechick
Summary: It’s nice. To see Mikey sleeping on Raph’s rising and falling chest, the safest both of them can be. To feel the tinge of human warmth April is seeping into the couch, definitively alive. To hear the sleepy mumbles of Donnie telling Leo to stop letting the cold air in and to just settle already.They’re all here, they’re all safe. Leo believed in everyone- even if they didn’t really believe in him, even if he doubted himself here and there- and he’s so glad that belief was rewarded.
Relationships: Donatello & Leonardo & Michelangelo & April O'Neil & Raphael (TMNT), Implied April O'Neil/Sunita (TMNT), Splinter & His Many Kids
Comments: 20
Kudos: 311





	safe and sound

**Author's Note:**

> i have a tumblr @ onthespectrumwriting, but folks probably already know it if you're familiar with my works :)

They’ve collectively got _just_ enough energy to drag themselves back to the lair. Everything hurts, they’re _exhausted,_ and sorely tempted to just flop down in a tunnel and sleep for a week, cockroaches and sewage be damned.

But, no, Splinter pesters anyone who lists too badly, getting them upright and on their feet again. He’s visibly flagging, same as the rest of them, but he and Leo had a handful of moments to rest and refuel. And he’s the adult, anyway. He can’t collapse like he wants to until his children are safe at home.

April doesn’t even try to protest being swept up in his fussing. She left a text with her family on the first day of the battle; telling them that she’d hunker down with her friends until the freaky rampage terrorizing NYC settled down. Her phone has been dead since the morning of day two, and she’s struggling to find the willpower to charge it once they’re home, let alone call her human family with an update.

(And the lair- it is home, for her. Human, mutant- whichever, she’s been tucked into the folds of the Hamato family for years. Her mom and dad, their apartment, that’s also still home, of course. But the lair, colorful and chaotic, is _home_ in a hard to describe way, and likely always will be.)

Donnie leans on his tech bo the whole way, the pristine craftsmanship of its surface scratched and splattered. The less said about his battle shell’s state the better. They’re just hoping it wasn’t pierced through. Mikey is straight up passed out, flopped over Raph’s wide shoulders. Whether the sleepy eldest brother has noticed or not, he carries their tuckered out youngest easily. After the reality defying tricks Mikey’s pulled off, consistently for three full days, he’s earned a nap before they begin the grueling work of cleaning up.

(They _will_ be talking about said reality defiance. There hasn’t been time, but Donnie is _dying_ to figure out how those impossible physics worked, and Raph wants to know why _he_ can’t throw cargo ships around like that. April is trying to not think about anything too hard; she’s already got a bad headache as is from the sleep deprivation.)

Leo is the only one not totally dead on his feet, but only by comparison, really. His façade of being the unruffled cool guy is strained, as he’d been fighting for hours with them prior to portaling away with Splinter, and the stuff with Big Mama… yeah, it’s been a _really_ long seventy-two hours.

Sure, he had all the pieces to the plan in his head, but to say he knew where they’d all fall, exactly, would be a lie. He doesn’t know how Donnie keeps all cylinders cranking, all the freaking time. Leo thinks he strained himself, just a little, with how quick he’d processed, analyzed, and altered his on-the-fly planning. Soon as he, and probably everyone else, have slept as long as needed, he’s going to play mind-numbing video games until the feeling goes away.

To further prove just how frazzled his mind is, Leo knocks into Donnie and they go down in a heap with pathetic twin whines. Coordination has deserted them. Well, at least they’re in the atrium and not the sewers?

“Sorry,” Leo says. He doesn’t move to get up.

“It’s fine,” Donnie says. He doesn’t move to get up, either.

“Hold Mikey,” Raph says, lowering their little brother to be on top of their pile. He goes limping off behind their dad, and April disappears for a few minutes, coming back in a fresh pair of clothes from her stash here. Loose t-shirt plus sweatpants; the only thing to wear in a post-mega-battle situation.

“Y’all are adorable,” April says, taking a seat next to them, “but that can’t be comfortable.”

“You’re here, too,” Leo points out.

“Boy, my legs are so tired I think they’re gonna fall off. Let a girl take a sit for a minute.”

“Pssh,” Leo hisses, but doesn’t follow up with anything. He’s too tired. April looks too tired to banter, too. They all look super rough. April has a dozen dark bruises on just her forearms, never mind whatever is hidden under her clothes. Leo personally has a few less than his brothers and her, as he’d missed out on the latter chunk of the beatdowns.

Mikey is blissfully unconscious still, escaping the scuffs and scratches that riddle him. Bruises, hastily bandaged cuts, spots of filth that might be congealed blood, might be caked mud, they don’t know yet. And he’s their mid-range fighter. Donnie, who vacillates between long-range and close-range manically, is in even worse shape. Emotionally, too. April hadn’t needed to be there to know that what the Shredder did to his tech? All those hours of creating and inventing, torn apart in a seconds long battle? That wounded him, deeply.

April touches Donnie’s forehead, brushing her thumb over the goofy eyebrows he determinedly puts on all his bandanas. He cracks open bleary eyes, and smiles wanly. April smiles, too, because she knows he’ll recover from this. They all will.

They’re strong. They’ve proven that a hundred times over, now.

Raph and Splinter come back, then. First aid kit and warm water plus towelettes to wash with. Mikey is roused gingerly, though they loathe to disturb him when he’s finally been allowed to sleep. He held out through everything, stalwart right to the last second. Splinter’s heart glows with pride for his children, each and every one of them, but for his youngest he has a particular soft spot. Michelangelo, Orange, Mikey, Angelo- whichever of his names, he is their smallest and brightest member. A member that doesn’t quite need protecting anymore.

(That isn’t to say, of course, that Splinter would ever even _imagine_ pulling back entirely. For any of them, for all of them, he is here and always will be.)

Mikey’s head is muddled and tired, but he scrapes together enough to focus on his examination. Bandages need to be changed, cold packs are put on the worst bruises, fresher cuts are cleaned and wrapped. No broken bones, but he does have some very tender wrists. Worrisome enough that his dad sternly tells him that there’s to be no ‘razz-ma-tazz’ for the next few nights.

Fair enough. Mikey is pretty sure he’s going to sleep _forever_ anyway.

“How did you do this to yourself?” Splinter asks at some point near the end, and Mikey yawns really wide, shrugging.

“Prob’bly the ship,” Mikey mumbles, rubbing his eyes. Ow, wrists, ow. He’s falling asleep again, regardless.

“What ship?” his dad asks, echoed by Leo’s interested hum.

“Threw it,” Mikey says, and mimes tossing his kusari-fundo’s whip, like a fishing rod. “ _Wachooo,_ right at the Shredder.” It hadn’t worked, exactly, but, eh. That’d been the first time he tried something that big. Next time he’ll get it right.

“You checked him for concussion, right?” Leo asks.

“What is he talking about?” Splinter asks Raph, who blinks a few times before remembering.

“Oh. Right. Yeah, Mikey somehow… threw a cargo ship? Like, a real one. With all the containers on it and everything.”

“He _what,”_ exclaim their dad and brother at the same time. Mikey lays down and just shuts his eyes, snuggling into the warm cape of Splinter’s kickin’ jumpsuit. The shock and awe and general chatter about his newest trick wash over him like white noise, hardly noticeable as he drifts off.

“Didn’t you plan for that to happen?” Donnie asks his twin, dry as a desert.

“No??” Leo replies, dumbfounded. “I thought he’d razz-ma-tazz a fire tornado again or something. I didn’t even know he could _do that.”_

“We didn’t either,” Raph admits, leaning heavily on his palm, hunched over his crossed legs. “How does someone- he’s so little, and I don’t think the 'fundo is supposed to do that, and just- how?!”

They all look at the perpetrator of their befuddlement. Mikey makes a faint wheeze of an exhale, curled up close to Splinter’s side, partially hidden by his cape.

“…Guess we ask later,” April says, shaking her head. Then she regrets the motion, wincing and raising an arm to massage a twinging neck muscle. It’s probably whiplash, unfortunately.

“How come I can’t throw boats,” Raph mutters disappointedly, a childish pout he’s only allowed to show now that they’re all safe again.

Donnie pats him on his spiny shell, minding his own sore fingers. “I’m sure you could if you wanted to, Raph. Mikey just happens to be very good at obliviously gaining sudden talents, and then forgetting to tell anyone.”

“A whole ship…” Leo mumbles, eyes squeezed shut as he deliberates on this new information. Well. If Mikey can do _that,_ then whatever on-the-go plans he comes up with in the future now have a lot of new options to them…

Something flicks him lightly between the eyes, eliciting a startled, “ _Bwuh?”_ and waking him up again. His dad is right in front of him, whiskers twitching in amusement as he lowers his tail. “Sleeping here will give you a bad back, Blue,” Splinter chides warmly.

“Wasn’t sleeping,” Leo protests, though he recalls the sensation of slipping gradually into darkness. Splinter clicks his tongue and prods Leo into standing, shooing him in the direction of the living room- everyone else is gone, he’s late to the migration.

The couch is old, musty, and a faithful pillar in their home. An ottoman and beanbags have been dragged up to it for extra space, adding more sprawling room. Raph has one end of the couch, feet up on a beanbag as he slumps into the cushions. Another half-dozen cushions are on top of him, along with blankets, and that’s where Mikey has been placed. They’re both covered in gauze and bandaids, across every limb, but look utterly peaceful in their sleeping arrangement.

Donnie is a long-limbed form, tucked right up against the cushions on the opposite end. His blanket covered legs extend over the ottoman, toes twitching as restless thoughts chase him through sleep. April is in the middle, given a sleeping bag and three cushions to herself. She’ll be complaining about her hair’s state, later, but for now she’s dead to the wold.

Leo climbs under the blankets next to Donnie. Shell to shell, like they’re tiny kids sharing a bunk again. Leo doublechecks his brother’s more vulnerable shell before that, obviously, just in case anyone missed injuries there. But, beyond a bit of bruising, it looks okay. Satisfied, Leo snuggles into the not-quite-big-enough space, not at all upset to be sardined in alongside his twin.

He'd bet everything on their capability, his brothers and April. Underneath his bravado and boasting, there was always the steady thrum of anxiety that maybe he’d underestimated the monster they were fighting, that he’d overestimated their cohesive combat skills, that maybe some sick stroke of bad luck would result in him and Splinter returning with their prize to find no one waiting for them.

It’s nice. To see Mikey sleeping on Raph’s rising and falling chest, the safest both of them can be. To feel the tinge of human warmth April is seeping into the couch, definitively alive. To hear the sleepy mumbles of Donnie telling Leo to stop letting the cold air in and to just settle already.

They’re all here, they’re all safe. Leo believed in everyone- even if they didn’t really believe in him, even if he doubted himself here and there- and he’s so glad that belief was rewarded.

Splinter’s clawed feet skritch-scratch over the metal grates of their living room, announcing his approach as he joins them. Leo feels another blanket thrown over him and Donnie, and he peeks open one eye to see their dad claim the last free surface for slumber. Turning in a circle on the large beanbag- one big enough to accommodate Raph- Splinter settles in a curled-up ball of pajama robes and fur.

Leo smiles, stifling a giggle at Splinter tucking his tail over his nose. When his dad glances at him, Leo pretends to not have seen and worms deeper into the blankets with Donnie.

There’s a single brief moment that this peace is disturbed, and it comes in the form of Mayhem dropping out of the air and onto April’s midriff. It causes a ripple of starts and jolts in them all, everyone flinching, ready to grab a weapon. But Mayhem whines apologetically and April sleepily exclaims, “ _Oh my god, you’re okay! Where have you been?”_ and begins cuddling the ragged creature. They relax again, after that.

-/-

“You’re kidding.”

“I’m really not!”

Raph, and their other siblings, continues staring at Leo. Leo throws his hands up, scoffing. What is it with this family and their utter lack of faith?

“Dad dated- eugh- Big Mama, it was a thing,” Leo repeats, shuddering along with his brothers. April, who has only recently met the spider yokai, raises an eyebrow.

“Granted, we were wrong about you having a plan,” Donnie says, reaching for another helping of cereal, “but if this is a jest to get back at us…”

Leo huffs, frowning. “Oh my god, I’m not lying. What _is_ it with you guys and not believing in me?”

“We believe in you,” Raph reassures him, patting his head. “We just… don’t believe dad would date an evil spider lady?”

“She was in human form, apparently,” Leo says, sulking a little still. Raph pats his head again. Leo scowls and munches on his bowl of cereal, a concoction of their most sugary types.

“I think there’s starting to be a pattern,” Mikey says, licking his fingers of cheerio dust. He’s eaten his cereal _dry, with his fingers,_ the heathen. “Big Mama’s an evil yokai, Baron Draxum’s an evil yokai…”

Donnie rubs his temples, looking queasy. “Please don’t imply our dad got it on with Draxum.”

Mikey shrugs and reaches for the milk to pour himself a glass. “I’m just saying. And he’s like, buff, right?”

“Mikey, you’re breaking your big brothers,” April scolds in good humor. While Mikey seems to be processing the revelation fairly easily, Raph and Donnie have matching expressions of confused horror. Leo, on his part, is well into simply accepting that their pops got up to unspecified _stuff_ with some of their greatest enemies.

Though, is Big Mama an enemy anymore? She did help them, and didn’t kill him and Splinter for outsmarting her… but that’s no guarantee towards trustworthiness. Frienemy, maybe? If they very, very carefully toe the line with her…?

“Hey, do lady spiders do cannibalism or am I misremembering?”

“That’s mantises,” Donnie corrects mildly. How Leo could forget that, after meeting Repo's mantis-cat, he doesn't know. “Though, male spiders in some species risk being killed by potential mates if they catch the female on a bad day. Or, if they fail in an attempt to seduce her.”

“Gross,” Mikey says, not all that disturbed.

“Gross,” Raph echoes, definitely disturbed.

“Cool,” April says, and then amends when she gets _looks._ “Not about Splint’ and Big Mama, just spiders in general, y’know?”

“I’m tryin’ to eat,” Raph complains, “can we talk about somethin’ not creepy-gross?” He glances to April. “Did you get a text back from Sunita yet?”

“Lil bit ago, yeah. She said she’d be here soon as she could-”

“ _Hello?”_ cries Sunita’s voice from the atrium. Speak of the devil.

Sunita follows their reply shouts, and barrels into the room in a flurry of unwinding illusions and worried hugs. “Oh my GOD,” she says into April’s untamed hair. “I was so crazy scared for you guys, no one was answering their cells, an’ the human TV news kept saying the attacks were still going until last night-”

“We’re good, Sunita,” April comforts, patting the warm solid-slime back of her friend. It feels really nice to get a hug from Sunita, after all the drama. If their hug lasts a little longer than could be labelled strictly ‘platonic’, well, the reluctance to step away is mutual.

Raph clears his throat softly to get their attention. “You and your dad did okay through the rampage? We, uh, kinda stopped paying attention to where Shredder teleported to, so long as we got there in time.”

“We were fine,” Sunita replies, and comes over to give him a big hug, too, stretching her arms to encircle her very large friend. Raph is gentle as he hugs her back. “And I’m so, so glad you’re all fine, too. Thank you for saving New York and the Hidden City, it was super brave.”

Raph huffs, a little flustered. “It was the right thing to do.”

“Still,” Sunita insists. She releases him and moves to the other three, going around with hugs until she’s back beside April, where she pulls up a stool to the island and sits. “Now spill! No one got any good videos or pics of your guys’ fights! I wanted so badly to come join in, but my dad wouldn’t let me out of the house until the all-clear was given. I was _so bored.”_

“Bored is definitely not what we were,” Donnie says, deadpan. Sunita beams at him; he crooks a smile, ducking his head a bit. They’ll all boast and cheer for themselves, but it’s a new thing to get praise from someone from outside the family. They’re meeting so many new people, these days.

“Where’s Splinter?” Sunita asks the table, and Leo replies their dad is probably in the bath still, resting his incredibly sore back. They make idle chit-chat until they hear wet plaps against the floor and a familiar voice calling, again from the atrium. It’s not their dad, but it is another waterlogged friend.

Buddy makes his appearance not long after Piebald has. He’s been pouting about not getting to come along for the mission, even though Raph has repeatedly tried to explain that mixing paper with a guy named _the_ _Shredder_ would’ve been a bad idea. Piebald meanwhile willingly steered clear of the whole thing, given she’d be at a pretty severe disadvantage unless their opponent teleported into a pond or pool.

Todd appears out of nowhere, at some point, and they only notice once he’s started serving lemonade. Mikey ends up clinging to Raph’s head, with Leo and Donnie and the others hiding behind their biggest sibling’s back. Raph is a tolerant, long resigned shield.

“I knew, soon as I saw the cable news, that it had to be you guys out there!” Todd exclaims, setting out more lemonade, oblivious to the way he startled every single one of them. “Heroes deserve celebration lemonade, so soon as it looked like it’d settled down, well, I hurried on down this way to congratulate you!”

“Thanks?” Raph says, accepting the very delicious beverage. He’s as unnerved as everyone else by the small mutant’s stealth skills, but he’s not going to refuse _lemonade._

“So, how’s the league of villains thing going?” Donnie inquires, because he’s genuinely curious.

“Oh, we dissolved the club pretty much right after our first meeting,” Todd replies, waving a hand and laughing. “I’m keepin’ in contact with a few of my friends, though! You know Repo, he’s such a cat person but he does love my puppies.”

“Didn’t he try to repossess your RV? Which would have made you homeless?”

“Water under the bridge. He’s even come up to help around the place regularly, now!”

Donnie and Mikey share a look. They suspect Repo Mantis never intended for that to happen, but Todd is _Todd_. Somehow, once he’s got his claws into you, there’s no escape. Maybe there’s something in the lemonade.

They both take another sip of their drinks anyway.

By the time Splinter shuffles into the kitchen, there’s a game of poker being played at the table, while Mikey and Todd prep various dishes. His fur is fluffed up and curling, it’s volume untameable for the moment. Splinter ignores the snorts and giggles from his children- the turtles, the human, the fish, and the slime one, too- and primly goes to steal from Mikey’s cutting board of fruits.

“Move over,” he demands, hopping up onto a stool between Blue and April. “Papa’s here to show you how it’s done.”

Donnie, the dealer of the round, smirks and deals his pops into the game. Not even two passes later, and Splinter is down to a bare fraction of his chips. April and Leo, currently in possession of the most chips, snigger and high-five over his head. Piebald curses as her cards slip from her damp fins once again, scrambling to pick them up. Raph is only just noticing that Buddy has absorbed both of theirs, and is frantically trying to figure out how to get them back out of his paper friend. Sunita laughs at all of them, cards close to her chest.

The next round, Sunita bets everything, and eggs April and Leo into doing the same. “It’s almost time to eat,” she encourages sweetly, so what do they have to lose?

Everything, actually. Leo and April have their heads down on the table as Sunita collects all of their chips for herself. Splinter mocks them, despite also having no chips left. Mayhem drops out of thin air in a burst of sparkling lights, sending the chips scattering as they rush to say hello to everyone who arrived while they were napping.

Poker is put away as Mikey and Todd rejoin the table. The cereal eaten earlier was only a holdover until they could find energy to make a real meal, so everyone has plenty of room for this. A bubbling hotpot is set in the middle of the island, the biggest of their pots chosen. The fruit and cold veggies platters are placed out near it, and another jug of lemonade as well. Plates, bowls, and utensils are passed around.

The meal is a messy, loud affair. Arms reaching across the table, voices talking over each other. Bickering over who gets which strip of beef from the pot, though the unspoken agreement is that Raph especially gets a decent portion, and Donnie, too. Meeting varying dietary needs is the norm in their home. Piebald is helped to mince her food to easily swallowed pieces, Buddy is given a stack of colorful craft paper (and warded off from trying real foods), Splinter, along with Leo and Mikey, grudgingly puts more vegetables and fruits onto their plates than noodles.

When Splinter complains one too many times about being denied extra noodles, Leo says, “You can have more, but first… Why don’t you tell us how you went from being trapped with Big Mama, to trapped with Draxum?”

Splinter stares at him, squinting through his puffed-up fur. Leo stares back, feeling emboldened by his recent successes.

He can’t stop the chopsticks which snatch a piece of beef off his plate. Leo shrieks in outrage, and is thoroughly distracted from the subject as he battles his dad with chopsticks. He’ll later understand that maybe Splinter doesn’t feel ready to share that aspect of their origins, but currently, he’s too incensed to calmly examine his dad’s avoidance behavior.

“More lemonade?” Donnie asks Sunita, who fits quite nicely into the chaos of his home. He privately hopes she’ll stick around for April; his pseudo-adopted sister deserves someone as lovely and sunny as the slime yokai.

“Yes please,” Sunita replies, enjoying herself immensely as the show goes on. Now, if she could only get up the courage to reach for April’s hand… but April is petting Mayhem in her lap, sneaking bites of food to them. Maybe next time.

“So, this is the family tree, currently,” Mikey says very seriously to Raph, both of them bent over a scrap of paper from Buddy’s plate. “We got all the dead ancestors here, and then dad, with Draxum and Mama being uhhh… involved, somehow. Then there’s us, and April, and Piebald, and- is Buddy your kid or dad’s?”

Raph shrugs. “Dunno. He feels like another brother, so the second one?”

“You’re the one who put him together, though…” Mikey hums thoughtfully. “And he’s from the Foot Clan, so does that mean they’re our in-laws, then?”

“Ew, no.”

“Okay, no to in-law, but like, definitely one half of his parentage. What’s that called?”

“…Donor?”

“Sure.”

“What are you two talking about?” Leo asks, having caught the tail-end of the conversation.

“Family tree mapping,” Mikey says proudly. He taps the paper in front of him, covered in messy scrawl. “We’ve got a dad, a crime dad, a crime _mom,_ and then April’s mom n’ dad sort of too, so that's three dads and two moms, and then there’s us five plus Piebald and Buddy kinda, whose extra dads are the Foot guys…”

Mikey keeps going, Raph nodding along. Leo blinks, not really comprehending. Splinter has his ears pinned flat, embarrassed about the discussion of his past _involvements._ Donnie, April, and Sunita all look at each other and decide not to try too hard to follow things, though Sunita and April do keenly hear how Mikey phrases that Sunita is a _close_ friend to the family.

“Where do I fit in?” Todd asks in an eager tone, leaning on his elbows. Mikey considers him, thinking hard.

“…The gay uncle?” Mikey suggests.

“Oh, perfect!”

Leo grimaces. “Mikey, we can’t just… oh, whatever. Sure.” It’s not like adding another non-blood relation to the tree will make it any more incomprehensible. Everyone has the odd uncle or aunt that they see sometimes but aren’t overly close to, right?

Eh, their family is weird in every respect. A puppy loving capybara mutant is hardly abnormal around here.

Leo snags some more meat from the hotpot before anyone can stop him. Another round of lemonade is poured for everyone, serious debates about silly topics easing the heavy tension that’d held them the past days.

They’re glad to be home, glad to be safe once more. Glad to have friends who’ve come to celebrate their victory, bringing with them cheer and distraction. Even after the plates are licked clean and the lemonade has been drunk, they linger in the slightly overcrowded space, playing cards and sharing the warm atmosphere.

**Author's Note:**

> i don't even like todd that much as a character?? he kinda just invited himself into this fic and didn't leave. like a real estranged relative would lol.
> 
> but yeah! i'm still shook over the finale+premiere. like wow!! fuck!!! rise is giving me zero (0) rest, pumping out all this fantastic content. i'm a prolific writer, but even I'M having a hard time keeping up with reaction-fics to canon. (i'm not complaining, just a bit Tired from irl)
> 
> looking forwards to more from the rottmnt crew, they're hands down now the best iteration of tmnt _ever._


End file.
